Journey lasts 70 years

Sunday

After nearly 70 years of service to various Monroe County churches as an organist, Lois Pearch has a chance to let someone else lead the congregation in music.

After nearly 70 years of service to various Monroe County churches as an organist, Lois Pearch has a chance to let someone else lead the congregation in music.

Ms. Pearch has retired, with her last performance as an official organist Sunday at Christ Evangelical Lutheran Church. She has led the music there since 1977, under the direction of six different pastors over the years.

"It's been a long journey, but it's been fun," she said. "I'm going to enjoy sitting in the pew."

The current pastor, the Rev. Dennis Bux, normally selects hymns for Sunday worship a few days in advance so the musicians can prepare or rehearse as needed.

But for the farewell Sunday, Ms. Pearch was told to select her favorite hymns. The pieces were: "Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee," "Beautiful Savior," and "On Our Way, Rejoicing."

While a retirement after so many years is worth noting, both she and Pastor Bux said it also is an example of changes in traditional church music.

Christ Lutheran will no longer have a sole organist responsible for every Sunday's services, along with holidays, weddings and funerals. There will instead be a team of five who take turns on a much less demanding schedule.

The reason: a combination of fewer people who have mastered the art of organ playing, and fewer churches that can afford a full-time musician.

"It's a dying art," she said.

Ms. Pearch said while she enjoyed the work, the weekend and holiday performance schedule was demanding. She didn't sit with her four children in the church pews when they were growing up. She also was responsible for arranging a substitute should she need to take time off.

Perhaps the most notable accomplishment, at least in Ms. Pearch's view, is that she never had the privilege of a music degree to support her in worship ministry.

She did take piano lessons as a young woman. Based on that training, she started playing organ at 16 at St. Matthew Lutheran Church on Ida-Maybee Rd. That congregation is one of the precedessors to the current Prince of Peace Lutheran Church in Ida.

The St. Matthew organ was a pump organ, she explained, the kind where the player had to pump feet in order to feed the bellows that made the music.

After her start at that church, she played at other Lutheran and Baptist churches in the area. She was glad to be offered the organist post at Christ Lutheran in 1977, originally as a "fill in," since that had become her family's church.

Ms. Pearch does keep an organ at home. It's a Hammond that she bought second-hand when she was 20. After acquiring that piece, she took private lessons for a time to help boost her skills.

The congregation she has served for most of her career recognized her talents. Pastor Bux said he noticed efforts were made to make sure the congregation could sing along, and that any soloists or instrumentalists were heard above the background of the organ.

Christ Lutheran thanked her with a reception after Sunday worship this week.

"She has been an exceptionally dedicated organist who has been a servant in every sense of the word," Pastor Bux said.

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